Niger is one of the poorest countries in the world; over eighty-five percent of the population live in rural areas where economic and social development are extremely low, with life expectancy less than forty-eight years, adult literacy only seventeen percent and infant mortality 123‰.

Poverty and gender inequality is identified to be the main obstacles to Kenya's human development. Women form a disproportionately large proportion of the poor and the report tries to find the connection between the two.